Letters From New York [Blood Magic, Book 2]

Chapter 13: Hate for the Holidays

When Bruce came through the door, my eyes immediately snapped to the shiny red and green box in his hands: he was holding a present. "You're awake!" he said, his smile utterly genuine. We hadn't exactly been on the best of terms before the thing on the roof, but it seemed that sometime during the weeks between then and now, Bruce had put it behind him. It still felt like yesterday to me.

I knew I should be smiling back at him – even just faking it – but I was too busy squinting at the gift box, trying to figure out why he had it. "What is that?" I asked, finally.

"It's from Lucia."

"She was just here. Why didn't she give it to me herself?" I demanded.

Bruce zigzagged around the machines to my bedside and set the box in my lap. "She didn't want you to feel bad about not having something to give in return."

I blinked up at him, still not understanding.

"It's Christmas Eve."

What? It can't be. When the initial shock faded, I felt annoyed. What the hell was everyone's problem? And why'd Lucia suddenly jumped on the Withholding Express?  "And she didn't... I can't..." I grumbled.

"Mills, relax," Bruce implored. "This is exactly why she didn't say anything; we told her not to stress or agitate you if you woke up. Not until the doctor was able to assess your condition."

When Lucia said I had been out for eighteen days, I didn't put it together; she'd given me all the hints I needed in the most careful way she could – she didn't have to, yet she had – and I'd missed it. The only person I could be mad at was myself.

"What happened to me?" I said.

"We were going to ask you that."

"I remember being up on the roof, feeling like I was going to faint. But eighteen days?"

"Dr. Warren, your father's private physician" – the sorcerer doctor, I thought – "thinks it was more than fainting. Fainting was a symptom, just like your coma, but the 'catalyst' – his word, not mine – was something tearing your magic out of you."

"My magic's gone?" My mind reeled. Screw Christmas. What the hell, Keel?

"No, not forever. Even when drained, a sorcerer eventually regenerates, assuming the draining doesn't kill him." Bruce stopped and looked pointedly at me. "Or her."

Like when I saved Keel, I thought, but that had been different somehow: that only knocked me out for a few hours. Of course, this time the magic hadn't been my doing, not even remotely.

"I could have died?"

"Hell, yeah. The doc said you were lucky; said you must have a horseshoe birthmark somewhere."

Keel doesn't know my death also means his! He wouldn't have done it if he had. Of that, I was sure. Even in this incarnation, he was far from the suicidal tendencies type.

"What could have done that to my magic?" I asked.

"We were wondering the same thing. You didn't use any up on the roof?"

"No," I said, and technically that wasn't a lie. "How would I explain that to Lucia? We were just up there, walking, talking –" I thought of all the disturbed snow "– throwing snowballs, then I got dizzy, and — well, you know what came next better than I do."

Bruce studied me. I hadn't been awake for a day and already I was being reminded of my specimen status.

"Where's Ephraim?" I said, distracting Bruce from his impromptu exam.